Various service providers often form business alliances or partnerships in which one service provider will “brand” its services to match the appearance or message of a partner's service. An example of such a relationship is branded credit cards, which are issued by one service provider, but are branded to present the name or logo of another service provider. In such a relationship, the two service providers typically operate within related, but non-overlapping market sectors. The partnership provides mutual benefits to both service providers, because whenever a customer uses the branded services, both partners are involved in the transaction, and the customer can be said to be using both services in unison. In addition, branded services bolster customer loyalty to both service providers.
Service providers are increasingly turning to the Internet, or World Wide Web (“Web”), as an additional outlet for providing their services. In the Internet context, a customer of the service provider accesses the service provider's services using a networked computer. The customer typically must “log in” to a service provider's system by submitting login data (usually a user name and password) to verify the customer's identity. If the user name and password are approved, then the customer may access the service provider's system resources during the ensuing login session. The login session ends after the customer stops using the resources for a predetermined period of time, or when the customer triggers a “log off.”
A customer of one Internet-based service provider may wish to access resources provided by a second Internet-based service provider. In the context of the Web, the service providers host websites (also called “sites,” “web pages,” or simply “pages”) that present an easily accessible user interface between a user and the service provider. The current inter-page access model is to “jump” from one service provider's website to the next using graphically selected hyperlinks, by typing a destination site, or by other means. Each different provider typically requires a different login data set, so in order to switch from one provider to another, the customer must enter the login data associated with the next provider. This can be a cumbersome process, as the customer must memorize or record many different sets of login data.
Several methods are known for reducing the inconvenient process of logging in to multiple service providers. These systems allow the customer to operate within a “Single Sign On” (SSO) environment. The SSO provides “seamless” or “transparent” access between Internet resources wherein the customer only has to log in once to access all of the service providers with which he has an account. Once logged in, the customer may jump from website to website without having to re-enter login information.
The SSO's provided by the prior art use a traditional inter-page access model, in which a user of one page simply jumps from one website to the next without experiencing any inter-site interconnectivity. Although each website may have related or similar-looking pages, each separate website may have differences in appearance and functionality. Under the current inter-page access model, the content of one service provider's website is typically uninfluenced by and unrelated to the content of previously visited service providers' websites. This is typically true even when the service providers have a business partnership. This type of inter-page access is “non-discriminatory” in that when a customer requests a second web page, neither the owner of the first web page nor the owner of the second web page discriminates whether there is a relationship between the first and second web page owners.
A drawback with the current non-discriminatory inter-page access system is that it can have a negative impact on business partnerships. For example, a customer may have a credit card that is provided by a bank, but that is branded with the markings of a stock broker as part of a business relationship between the bank and the stock broker. In addition, the bank and the stock broker may each have an Internet website. When the customer accesses the stock broker's website to make a stock transaction, he or she may wish to check his stock broker-branded credit card account. Using conventional inter-page access, when the customer rag accesses the bank's website the customer will see an entirely different web page, which may not appear to be affiliated with the stock broker at all. This lack of brand continuity can weaken the customer's inclination to use the two service providers in unison, and may lead to customer confusion.
Conventional SSO systems do nothing to solve this problem. Although there is continuity of access between the websites, which is provided by the SSO system, there is a discontinuity between the service providers because the branded relationship between the two service providers does not exist in the web context.
In addition to weakening the customer's brand association and loyalty, non-discriminatory inter-page access between service providers can also directly interfere with business partnerships by providing conflicting services to customers. A central service provider may have a partnership with many partner service providers that compete against one another in the same market. To continue with the above example, a single credit card issuer may offer various stock broker-branded credit cards pursuant to partnerships with several competing stock brokers. The credit card issuer may wish to advertise the availability of all of these different stock broker-branded credit cards to potential customers on its website. When a customer accesses the credit card issuer's website by way of a link on his selected stock broker's website, he will see advertisements for the services of competing stock brokers. An individual stock broker would be opposed to presenting advertisements for its competitors' services to customers who have already become affiliated with that stock broker, and this would create a disincentive to enter into a business partnership with the credit card provider. Although such advertising may be beneficial to the credit card provider, it would, in effect, facilitate competition between the various stock brokers, which may strain the business relationship between the partnered companies.
The problems presented by the traditional inter-page access model increase as the complexity of the business partnerships increases. These problems also increase as users of various service providers employ SSO systems to obtain seamless access to various service providers. In the developing environment of the Internet, users may become less loyal to partnered groups of services because these partnerships are very hard to distinguish. Other problems with conventional inter-site access and SSO systems exist.
It would therefore be desirable to provide a system and method of providing discriminated system resources to users of multiple partners' systems, and to provide other improvements.